


Life Facts

by I_have_a_Mycroft_of_my_very_own



Series: Suilad Aran Thranduil [16]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Pain, more pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-04
Updated: 2014-08-04
Packaged: 2018-02-11 17:48:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2077389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_have_a_Mycroft_of_my_very_own/pseuds/I_have_a_Mycroft_of_my_very_own
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Knowledge is power, his father says, so he reads and regales his father with all the little, seemingly useless facts he discovers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Life Facts

**Author's Note:**

> This is probably the most draining thing I have ever written. Took me over 4 hours to write, not including interruptions by friends and only including about half of the time I spent on research for facts I could use that could also maybe relate to things in Middle-earth. Words things correctly is hard when you're going for a certain vibe. :/

_Some male spiders pluck their webs like harp strings to attract females._

\--

It plays out like a weird dream. That should say something about him, about his life. It should say something that when his life flashes before his eyes, it plays out like a silly dream. It doesn’t even play out in order, but then why would he ever have expected it to?

\--

_Butterflies are cold blooded._

_\--_

The first time he kisses Lalaithiel his breath is stolen away. It’s raining, the tree they huddle under shelters them as best it can. She tastes sweet, like the strawberries he knows she indulges in. She smells of earth and rain. He loves her more than words can ever describe.

\--

_Mayflies live for 24 hours._

\--

His father shelters him, refuses to allow him to go hunting with the others, and refuses to allow him to leave the city. The day he comes of age he sneaks away from the city, passes through Melian’s girdle. He is young. He is stupid.

\--

_Butterflies taste with their feet._

\--

His son is so tiny in his arms. He is terrified he’ll break him. Lalaithiel laughs at him and tells him to stop being silly. “No one will break little Greenleaf.” She tells him. He kisses her, she tastes of sweat and flowers. He loves her more than words can ever describe. He loves the little bundle in his arms more than words can ever describe.

\--

_Hummingbirds are the only birds that can fly backwards._

\--

His mother dies giving birth, they can’t save the second child, a girl. His father grieves furiously and goes through great pains to protect him. He doesn’t appreciate it as much as he later realizes he should have.

\--

_A rat can last longer without water than a camel._

\--

By the time he turns twenty he has already mastered sword fighting, and archery, and combat with knives. He is too young to go with any patrols or hunting parties. He turns his attentions to knowledge. Knowledge is power, his father says, so he reads and regales his father with all the little, seemingly useless facts he discovers.

\--

_Bees and cicadas make noise by rapidly moving their wings._

\--

Once outside the girdle, he feels a little lost. There is a little human settlement nearby, curiosity gets the better of him. Sickness has taken the settlement. The first time he watches someone die he tries desperately to save them. He doesn’t know healing, he doesn’t have the touch. The boy dies in his arms. He huddles in a corner and cries until the ache in his heart doesn’t hurt so much.

\--

_Deer can't eat hay._

\--

The last time he kisses Lalaithiel his heart breaks in his chest. It’s sunny, they are shaded by the tree they shared their first kiss under. Her lips are cold, she tastes of blood and tears. She smells of death. He loves her more than words can ever describe.

\--

_Cats use their whiskers to check whether a space is too small for them to fit through or not._

\--

He shelters Legolas, perhaps more than his father sheltered him. He knows from experience that Legolas will not appreciate it, and he doesn’t expect him to. Legolas is 300 when he finally lets him go out on patrols. Legolas returns from his first patrol unscathed, it is not to last.

\--

_Orange trees can bear fruit for more than 100 years._

\--

The smoke from the pyres burns his eyes and fills his lungs. Blind and choking, he stumbles his way through the battlefield, through the bodies of the dead, those still awaiting burial or burning. There is nothing more for him here. Nothing more for him among these bodies. Nothing more for him upon this field. He buried his father this morning. He will never come back here again.

\--

_Oak trees are struck by lightning more often than any other tree._

\--

He steps back through the girdle, he wanders aimlessly through the forest. He stumbles across a young girl, little older than the boy in the settlement had been, both years from maturity. Years neither would get to live. She is skeleton thin and her breaths come in wheezing gasps. The pain in her eyes is unimaginable. There is nothing he can do for her, she is lost in Melian’s girdle. His father would call it mercy if he puts his dagger through her heart. He doesn’t. Can’t bring himself to do it. He cradles her in his arms and waits for her to die. His heart pounds so painfully in his chest when he leaves her. He has no more tears to cry.

\--

_The onion is a lily._

\--

He is a king before he learns what his mother looks like. He wonders if his sister would look like her if his sister had survived. His father never told him that he’d been a twin, his father had never needed to. There is a hole in his heart where he knows someone else is meant to dwell, where someone else will never dwell. They would have been two halves of the same coin, but she never had the chance.

\--

_Oak trees do not have acorns until they are fifty years or older._

\--

He sends Legolas out on a simple mission to bring word of Gollum’s escape to Elrond. It is over a year before he sees his son again. War changes his son as it changed him. Somehow the ache in his chest doesn’t seem painful enough. The war is over, they won. Somehow it almost doesn’t seem worth the price.

\--

_Without lightning, plants could not live._

\--

He is competing with Legolas in archery when the dragon comes. He hears it roaring in the distance and prays it stays away from the forest. He lets Legolas win, and vehemently denies it when Legolas calls him out on it. He waits for the ruin of fire, but it never comes. Each year his kingdom continues unchallenged by the beast, and each year he counts his blessings.

\--

_The oak tree has vertical roots which provide a more direct route to ground water._

\--

He was king within two hours of the battle starting. Within four hours of the battle starting he could count on one hand the friends he still had. Five hours in, and the best he could do was call a desperate retreat and hope to get out alive. Somehow he gets out alive, and somehow he still has one dear friend by his side, and somehow he manages to save one quarter of the army his father led into battle. He prays they will recover. They never recover.

\--

_The fragrance of flowers is due to the essences of oil they produce._

\--

He watches them sail away. He knows he will never see either of them again. Once again he is all alone. The gulls mock him, but their curse is not to be placed upon him, only those that he loves. Home is where the heart is and his heart is all over the place.

\--

_The bark of redwood trees is fireproof. Fires within redwood forests take place inside the trees._

\--

He has never killed before. There is fire and fighting and blood and death. This is the only home he has ever known, and it’s being stolen from him. Stolen from him by the dwarves. He watches his tutors fall beneath the sword. He watches his friends struggle to get their wives, their children, their siblings, their parents out of the mess. So much blood. So much death. He vows upon all that he is losing that he will never forgive the dwarves for this.

His sword is dripping blood by the time he and his father, and the others pass through the girdle never to return again.

\--

_Sloths take two weeks to digest their food, for this reason, sloths can starve to death._

\--

When the dwarves stumble into the festival he knows it is over. If they bring the wrath of the dragon down upon his people, down upon his forest he will curse them, them and all their kind. If they are the reason his son is stolen from him, he will not rest until they pay. He’s not surprised when the dwarves stumble into their midst. The dead of Doriath still scream in his ears. The betrayal of the dwarves still burns hot in his heart. With the level of greed the dwarves possess, how could they let Erebor alone, when Smaug could not?

\--

_Snakes can see through their eyelids._

\--

He should have expected this. But who expects to wake up one morning and see the flame of a candle through their own hand? They call it fading because you fade away. He should have expected this.

\--

_They say you have a greater chance of surviving if it hurts._

It doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t hurt at all.


End file.
